Designing a Simple Solution for Receipts: A Shoeboxed Success Story

With Shoeboxed, there has never been one “best” way to use our service to stay organized. And after processing over a billion dollars of expense data since 2007, we say that from years of firsthand experience!

Shoeboxed takes enormous pride in serving clients from around the country and across the globe, all of whom use our service in a myriad of ways to fulfill a whole host of organizational needs in both their personal and professional lives.

“I really do use Shoeboxed after what it is named: it is my catchall for business receipts that I need to save and sort later.”

Shoeboxed: We’re excited to chat with you, Janine! Thanks for taking the time. Let’s start with you telling us a bit about yourself and UPPERCASE.

Janine Vangool: Absolutely. I’ve been using Shoeboxed for almost a year, so I’m thrilled to share my experience! Anyway, my background is in graphic design, and nearly five years ago I founded a magazine. It started out as my own side dream project and quickly took over. UPPERCASE is a quarterly magazine for the creative and curious—our content is inspired by design, illustration and craft. We have around 3000 subscribers around the world. I’m the publisher, editor and designer. I have two employees: Jocelyn handles subscriptions and wholesale accounts and Erin does marketing and publicity.

SBX: Nothing makes us happier than seeing someone turn a side business into a full-time career, so that’s awesome. How did you get started?

JV: When I was studying design in college, I always imagined someday having my own design studio. This happened a lot sooner that I thought; a few months after graduating, I started freelancing. The freelancing grew into a nice graphic design business, but after a dozen years I was looking for more of a challenge. UPPERCASE developed out of the desire to create and author my own projects.

SBX: That sounds like a natural progression, but going from a freelancer to managing your own employees can be quite a change! What’s the most stressful part of your job?

JV: Absolutely. I’d have to say that the most stressful aspect is managing the responsibilities of the business; there are so many demands on me and my time that the actual creative aspect of the business is often lower on the priority list. I’m striving to fix that!

SBX: The administrative side of things is difficult for many of our users, so we do everything we can to ease that strain. Let’s talk about the fun side though: what’s the biggest upside to running UPPERCASE?

JV: The best part of the job is finding inspiring content and collaborating with talented people from around the world. It is very satisfying to see it all come together in print.

SBX: That must be fulfilling. We’d love to hear a bit about what you did with all your documents before Shoeboxed. How did you stay organized before using our service?

JV: In previous years, most of my bills were still the old-fashioned paper variety which were stored in their proper folder in a filing cabinet. And there they stayed until tax time! With a concerted effort this year to go paperless, my bills and receipt are primarily by email, which makes sorting and reporting so much easier.

SBX: Nice! Can you tell us about how you found out about Shoeboxed, and how you use it now?

JV: Sure. I’ve been a regular user of Evernote for many years, saving pertinent invoices and receipts into that system. Since Shoeboxed integrates with Evernote, that process is much easier. I simply use email (or the app to snap a photo) and forward my receipts to Shoeboxed. Once all of my receipts have been organized in Shoeboxed, they automatically get archived in Evernote for my own records. I also use the integration with QuickBooks Online so that my bookkeeper can easily access everything he needs.

SBX: That’s awesome! We’re so glad you’ve made our integrations a part of your workflow. If you had to sum up your Shoeboxed experience in a single sentence, what would you say?

JV: I really do use Shoeboxed after what it is named: it is my catchall for business receipts that I need to save and sort later.

SBX: Perfect. Would you say we make it easier for you to stay organized and/or for your business to grow? How so?

JV: Now that I’ve been using Shoeboxed for many months, it is second nature to send my receipts there. It feels good to have that organization taken care of and not be surrounded by paperwork to file. It certainly frees up more valuable time for me to take care of other aspects of growing my business.

SBX: We’re thrilled to hear that. Lastly, do you have any helpful tips for our users or small business owners that are trying to get organized?

JV: I always recommend Evernote for creative people trying to stay organized. Whether it’s a written note or a saved image, I have nearly five years worth of notes there— it is invaluable to be able to access old ideas, links you’ve saved, things that inspired then and now. It’s on my phone and my laptop; it goes everywhere my brain goes!

SBX: We love Evernote too! Thanks for taking the time to chat with us, Janine! We’re thrilled to be a part of your business’s growth by providing a simple solution for receipts.

Are you a Shoeboxed user who has a success story and would like to be featured on our blog? Then we would love to hear from you! Please reach out to Emily at emily@team.shoeboxed.com for more information.